Date:         Thu, 27 Jun 2002 13:03:47 -0500
Reply-To:     rodney.woten@LENNOXIND.COM
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Rodney Woten <rodney.woten@LENNOXIND.COM>
Subject:      '87 westy oxygen sensor problems.
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

Greetings all,

Hoping someone can help out.  Unfortunately I need to make a short story long (or a long story even longer), so please bear with me.

My wife & I bought an 87 Westy in Columbus, OH.  Somewhere between there and our home in Des Moines, the exhaust system became disconnected at the flange between the elbow pipe attached to the caty and the convergence of the headers.  Problem is that as this fell to the ground, the wires were ripped from the oxygen sensor.  We finished our drive home, and although the van seemed to be running a bit rich, it ran very well.  A week later the new oxy sensor shows up on our doorstep.  I splice it in as I was instructed to do and take it out for a test drive.  Pulling away from stop signs there was major hesitation.  You could put the accelerator all the way to the floor and the van would creep/almost stall until about 2500 RPM's when it would take off like a racehorse.  I thought maybe I spliced the wrong white wire to the wrong matching white wire, so I went home and switched them.  The next morning I tried it again.  It ran very well for about 15 minutes, then it was back to its old tricks again.  I unhooked the sensor and the van runs fine again, albeit a bit on the rich side.  I have to wonder of the old sensor I removed was even working before the wires were ripped out of it.  What else should I check??

Thanks in advance!!!
Rod Woten
Wally the '87 Westy